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H2020Individual fellowship2016–2019

EUICIT · EU Intersex Citizenship

Horizon 2020 — Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions

Duration
2016-09-01 → 2019-09-04
EU contribution
€183,455
Participants
1
Scheme
MSCA-IF-EF-ST

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Results in brief

EU Intersex Citizenship

Intersex in an umbrella term that can be defined as being born with bodily sex characteristics that do not conform to standard binary definitions of male or female. In this arena stakeholders use a wide variety of terms such as intersex, variations of sex characteristics (VSC), Disorders or differences of Sex Development (DSD for disorder and dsd for differences), and variation-specific medical terms. Those concerned with human rights and citizenship tend to focus on problematic practices as opposed to terminology differences, while primarily using the terms intersex or VSC. The global medical treatment of VSC continues to include practices that are experienced by affected individuals as harmful, including infant and childhood surgeries, sterilisation, and hormone treatment conducted for psycho-social motives without consent of the child. The main research objectives were to: • Develop specialised knowledge on the two main strands of intersex/DSD agendas in the EU; those claiming intersex identities and rejecting the pathologization of intersex, and those associated with DSD medical approaches. • Develop knowledge of intersex/DSD citizenships, including the claims of individuals/groups with specific medical conditions which have broad, socially-transformative agendas. • Provide socially situated comparative knowledge about intersex/DSD activism, citizenship, and democracy in the EU.

Data: CORDIS, © European Union

Project objective

The EUICIT action addresses the rights claims and agendas of intersex people and those with Disorders of Sexual Development (DSD), in response to recent Council of Europe recommendations to revise medical and policy approaches. The term 'Intersex' refers to people born with sex characteristics (chromosomal, gonadal and/or anatomical) not easily classifiable as either male or female; at least 1 person in 2000 is intersex/has DSD. Intersex/DSD people are a highly marginalised section of the EU population. Conflicts exist between those who seek to depathologise intersex and those who seek rights within the medical framework (DSD-oriented. There is a pressing need for research that highlights the experiences, understandings, and views of intersex/DSD people within a European context. In particular, an investigation of debates about intersex versus DSD perspectives is necessary, because of the divergent human rights and social policy implications of these two approaches. EUICIT is framed within interdisciplinary citizenship and participative democratic approaches, in order to highlight human rights issues, and to explore tensions between medical-oriented rights claims and those that seek depathologisation. It uses triangulated qualitative research methods: documentary and policy analysis across the EU, interviews with activists and healthcare/policy actors in Italy, the UK and Switzerland, and participant observation in a secondment organisation (Zwischengeschlecht- ZW). The case study countries were chosen to represent varied types of intersex/DSD activism and relationship to the EU. ZW, which is based in Switzerland, takes a combined medical/activist approach; it is actively engaged in policy work at national and international levels and is ideally suited to fieldwork on the topic. The project team has been assembled to help the applicant develop her existing expertise, drawing in expertise of gender theory, citizenship and human rights.

Original text from CORDIS.

Participants

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Data: CORDIS, © European Union